MADRID (Reuters) – Spanish police seized two metric tonnes (4,409 pounds) of cocaine with a street value of about 70 million euros ($76.7 million) from a single-mast sailboat they intercepted off Spain’s northern coast, the country’s tax agency said on Wednesday.
It said the location of the haul, in the Bay of Biscay, was “totally exceptional”. Most cocaine shipments from Latin America to Europe are seized along Spain’s western Atlantic coast.
The 13-metre (43-foot) long vessel named Night Falls was sailing under a British flag when it was intercepted some 30 nautical miles off the port city of Santander.
All four of its crew – a Spaniard, a Colombian national and two Venezuelan citizens – have been taken into custody.
The joint operation between Spanish police, customs officials and Britain’s National Crime Agency was launched based on intelligence provided by the Maritime Analysis and Operations Centre-Narcotics, a law enforcement initiative involving six European Union countries and Britain.
The tipoff sparked a 48-hour search by air and sea that led to the Night Falls being apprehended, the statement said.
($1 = 0.9122 euros)
(Reporting by David Latona; Editing by Barbara Lewis)
